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By Root 406 0

a Cockney accent, but you will get to hear the closing titles sound track ‘What’s it all about, Alfie?’ because Burt Bacharach only wrote it after he saw an American preview), but I hadn’t really thought it was likely to happen. Just shows how much I knew . . . And Lewis was right. I did get nominated for an Academy Award by the people in my boyhood dreamland, Hollywood. I didn’t go to the ceremony and in the end it was just as well. The Oscar was won by my favourite stage actor (and friend) Paul Scofield in the movie version of my favourite stage play, A Man for All Seasons. I asked his wife later where he was when he heard the news. ‘On the roof of our barn,’ she said, ‘mending it.’ ‘What did he say?’ I persisted. ‘Oh – you know, “Isn’t that nice, dear?”’ I have been nominated many times for an Oscar and won it twice, and whenever I see the tears and tantrums at today’s ceremony, I always think of Paul and smile.

But all this was in the future. I had filmed Ipcress and Alfie back to back, and was first waiting for the release of The Ipcress File and the verdict of the critics. It didn’t look too promising. Harry Salzman and I sneaked out of the low-key premiere to gauge the reaction of the audience and the first man we spoke to told us he thought it was the biggest load of crap he’d ever seen. I was immediately plunged into the depths of gloom and went off and got very drunk. I woke up the next morning with a stinking hangover and, feeling very sick, went off to get the papers.

The first review I read confirmed my worst fears: it was awful. But the next one was good, the one after that was even better and after that the good notices began to pile up so consistently that even I could see that I had made it. I began to cry – not just quietly, but great heaving sobs I couldn’t control. After all this time, after all the knock-backs, the rejections, the struggle – I really was a success. Without quite realising what I was doing, I scrunched up the papers and started throwing them out of the window, howling as I did so. ‘Oi!’ a voice from the street below shouted. ‘What do you think you’re doing?’ An old charlady was standing there looking up at me, hands on hips. ‘Come down here and pick these up!’ she shrieked and, then, seeing my tear-stained face staring down at her, ‘You don’t need to cry,’ she said more kindly. ‘It’s time you grew up.’

I took a deep breath and looked around me. She was right: I did need to grow up. I was thirty-two. I had been so focused on work that I hadn’t had a chance to sit back and take stock. I went down to the street and picked up all the paper and vowed that from now on I’d take things a little more calmly.

I couldn’t have got away with sneaking out of the premiere of Alfie as I had at The Ipcress File. This was the real deal. It was held a year later in March 1966 at the Plaza in Piccadilly and was a massive event. It seemed as if anyone who was anyone in the Sixties was there – from all of the Rolling Stones and the Fab Four Beatles to Barbra Streisand and Tippi Hedren, who fainted during the abortion scene and had to be carried out. This time I did take my mum. When I look back, I can see that she hadn’t wanted to go to the Zulu premiere because she was terrified she might make a mistake and screw up my career at such a delicate stage – that was the way she thought. I think it was probably a class thing and she was intimidated by the thought of all those people in evening dress. She was completely devoted to what I was doing – mind you, she wasn’t quite sure what it was – but she trusted me. She hadn’t wanted to go to the premiere, but she still wanted to witness it.

Things were different at the premiere for Alfie. The party afterwards was in a pub called The Cockney Pride and Mum almost had to be forcibly removed at two in the morning. It was a great night, but best of all was sharing it with the person who had done so much to make it all possible. But my mum was not going to let any of my success go to her head. She still worked as a charlady, getting up at six in the morning to clean